08 May 2013 04:08:50
Here's a new definition of "the sweep of history". Bernstein begins in 2300BC with Sargon, all-conquering ruler of lands from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean, and ends with Twitter. It's a long, often fascinating journey. His thesis is simple, sometimes too simple. He believes the word sets people free, and so is democracy's trump card. Once Sumerian had become the first syntactically complex language, it could bind vast empires, like the one Sargon built. Once enough ancient Greeks became literate, they could construct a glorious civilisation. Once Gutenberg invented his printing press, the merchant class of Europe could read and write in its native tongues – and the Catholic church lost its ability to use Latin as the monopoly language of entrenched power. It is a rollercoaster ride, of course. The liberating rise of the modern newspaper also, before too long, saw the rise of the manic proprietor, insisting that only his opinion counts. The birth of radio, oddly enough, gave the forces of dictatorship and repression – from Moscow to Rwanda – their perfect weapon of top-down propaganda. But see now how Tim Berners-Lee has set us free! An open web and open journalism combine at last in perfect, intrinsically democratic communication. A more cynical chapter about the pall of digital's giant corporations remains to be written, perhaps: but this is still an engaging mix of theory, fact and enlightenment from across the millennia that wears its rich scholarship lightly.
